The new Lagerstroemia cultivar is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the inventor, Michael Uchneat, in Bellefonte, Pa. The objective of the breeding program was to produce new Lagerstroemia varieties with a compact habit, superior winter hardiness and dense flowering. The open pollination resulting in this new variety was made during August of 2010.
The seed parent is the, patented commercial variety referred to as Lagerstroemia ‘Red Filli’ U.S. Plant Pat. No. 14,353. The pollen parent is unknown as it was an open pollination breeding program. The new variety was selected September of 2011 by the inventor in a group of seedlings resulting from the 2010 open pollination, in a seedling trial field in Bellefonte, Pa.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar was performed by softwood cuttings. This was first performed at Spring Meadow Nursery in Bellefonte, Pa. during February of 2012 and has shown that the unique features of this cultivar are stable and reproduced true to type in multiple successive generations.